"THE youth of America is their oldest tradition," observed J. Oscar Wilde. Although the U.S. is not as young as it used to be, it still views all kinds of tradition with more youthful irreverence than any other nation, past or present. In fact, there is a widespread suspicion that tradition—the sense of continuity that is part faith, part convention and part habit—is disappearing altogether from the American scene.
In other and older countries, tradition is the visible testament to established order; referring to the matches between amateur and professional cricketers, the British still speak of The Gentlemen and The Players. Sometimes tradition is a means of reassurance in an uncertain world; "Do not introduce innovations," warns a Taoist maxim. Tradition ranges from philosophy to fashion, from faith to manners, from the highest regions of polity to the humdrum level of a city sidewalk. (Will the last woman who saw the last man tip the last hat please stand up?) At least on the surface of U.S. life today, it is difficult to find any institution or idea that people dare uphold primarily in the name of tradition—not God, not country, and certainly not Yale, not the sanctity of motherhood or of private property, not even baseball, the automobile or psychoanalysis. As U.C.L.A. Sociologist Ralph Turner put it, only half in jest: "A tradition is something you did last year and would like to do again."
Rebels without Targets
The evidence is everywhere the eye lights, the ear listens, the commentator prowls, or the station wagon travels. If there is anything left of the Puritan tradition, it is hard to detect. Perhaps its strongest remaining element is what sociologists call the "work ethic." Executives and businessmen seem to work harder than ever (and certainly harder than the average union members), and so do students, whatever their other diversions. At the same time, thrift is no longer a virtue—it is, in fact, nearly subversive—pleasure is an unashamed good, leisure is the general goal and the subsidized life, from Government benefits to foundation grants, is eagerly welcomed. Such notions as waiting to marry until one can support a wife now seem incredibly quaint.
As to sexual morality, the traditional rules are giving way to "situation ethics"—meaning that nothing is inherently right or wrong, but must be judged in context on the spur of the moment. This is particularly true among the young, and many adults simply go along with what they feel they cannot change. Dr. Ruth Adams, incoming president of Wellesley, proposed that the college issue birth-control materials to the students. Chastity, however, is possibly not the most important tradition questioned by youth. Society expects the young to be rebellious, but the trouble today is that they don't even know what to rebel against. Says Author Paul Goodman, a middle-aged and professional rebel: "When the young today look back to the Bible, John Locke and Immanuel Kant, they cannot realize that all this was for real. They will have to make their own way. The loss of tradition is tragic because a generation cannot break away from a past into bold new creative patterns if it has no relationship to the past."